SCOTUS accepts birthright citizenship appeal

Okay, sometime in the Spring we'll find out whether any of the unwelcome arguments buzzing in my brain will become law.

Generally, the Supreme Court won't accept an appeal in the face of unanimity among the Circuits. They must have something they want to say on the subject. That might bode well for Trump.

 

Just in time to disenfranchise voters for the midterms. How convenient.

 

No, as much as I may agree with the sentiment, Trump's Executive Order is prospective. No currently recognized citizens lose their citizenship.

Yet.

 

What you posted is a speculation.

From what I read on line the Supreme Court accepted the case now because the petition finally reached the Court after going through the lower-court process, not because of an election calendar. SCOTUS hears cases when:

A petition meets the criteria (importance, constitutional question, split or near-split).

Four justices vote to grant certiorari.

The docket allows it.

The Court does not schedule cases around election cycles, and the birthright-citizenship question has been percolating for decades.

If SCOTUS wanted to influence midterms, it would issue stays or emergency rulings via the “shadow docket,” not wait for full briefing and argument.

Anyone born in the U.S. and already recognized as a citizen cannot be retroactively de-citizened by executive order or even by statute.
The Supreme Court is extremely clear on this (Afroyim v. Rusk, 1967; Vance v. Terrazas, 1980).

The issue as I understand it is for future birts.
Babies born in 2025 do not vote in the 2026 midterms.

No adult citizen’s status is affected.

But I'm far from being a professional in law field so will listen to what professionals say.


So the “planned timing” claim is speculative and unfounded.

 

If it is clearly solidified in law in their minds then they need not take it up and would defer to lower rulings.

They have a penchant for overturning “set precedent”. For whatever reason, they set this case to happen and likely be decided right before the midterms.

It will certainly hold influence over midterms as almost every landmark supreme court case has had influence on the political landscape.

If you know something about it that we do not then please share, but I am gravely concerned they will attempt to disenfranchise voters as they already have on the Texas gerrymandering case and are set to on other racial gerrymandering cases.

 

Influence the political debate?
Sure — almost every landmark case does.

I just seach on the internet.
I'm very weak in politics, so can be off.

Taking up a case does not automatically imply an intention to disenfranchise anyone, especially when the legal question deals only with the status of future births, not existing voters.


The fact that SCOTUS wants to clarify a doctrinal question does not imply any effect on current citizens. Courts sometimes accept cases simply to:
clarify the meaning of a constitutional phrase,
update doctrine in light of new arguments, or
correct what they see as overly narrow reasoning in lower courts.

This can happen even without a circuit split (e.g., Dobbs, Heller, Janus, etc.).
None of that equals a plan to change the citizenship of adults who already have it.

Am I missing anything?

Even if they reinterpret “subject to the jurisdiction,” the Court cannot constitutionally:

strip citizenship retroactively, nullify voting rights of adults who already have them, or declare millions of U.S.-born adults to be non-citizens.

This isn’t speculation on my part — the Court has said so repeatedly in Afroyim v. Rusk, Terrazas, and other cases.
Existing citizenship is a vested constitutional right.

 

Roe v Wade was also settled law until this supreme court overturned it.

 

True but the Trump Executive Order itself does not go so far so the issue isn't before the Court. If you read my earlier posts on the subject you will see that I agree with you about the very real possibility that this Court will side with Trump and uphold the EO.

That decision, btw, wouldn't actually overrule any previous case law. This exact issue hasn't reached the Supreme Court before now. We've more or less just assumed what the law would be.

 

I asked Google Gemini

Roe is actually a perfect example of why your concern can’t apply to citizenship.
Roe dealt with a judicially-created right, not an explicit textual constitutional guarantee.
Birthright citizenship is the opposite.

Here’s the key distinction:


---

1. Roe v. Wade was based on implied constitutional reasoning

Roe was grounded in:

the penumbras of the Bill of Rights,

a derived “right to privacy,”

and substantive due process.


Because it was an interpretive construction built on implied rights, it was always vulnerable to reinterpretation by a different Court.

That’s why Dobbs could overturn it.


---

2. Birthright citizenship is NOT an implied right — it is written explicitly into the Constitution

> “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States.”
— 14th Amendment, Section 1



This is not a judicial inference.
It is direct constitutional text.

And most importantly:

Nothing in the case before SCOTUS touches the citizenship of any existing voter.

Even if the Court adjusted how the “jurisdiction” clause applies to future births, they cannot:

revoke existing citizenship,

convert adults into non-citizens, or

cancel existing voting rights.


Roe being overturned does not mean the Court can erase explicit constitutional rights.

 

Okay, if you want specific examples of the government unconstitutionally violating civil rights I can give you a long list. Even examples of the courts agreeing with said unconstitutionality.

I was using Roe to show they are happy to overturn precedent.

 

Well, they did overturn Roe and they abandoned the deference standard for administrative interpretation of regulations. What other examples are you thinking of?

Oh, and they also abolished most nationwide injunctions but I don't know what cases they overruled in doing so.

 

I was specifically thinking of
Plessy v Ferguson and Dred Scott v Sandford.

The 14th amendment played a role played a significant role overturning these, yet here we are ruling the 14th again. My fear is the supreme court will somehow make a carve out for the amendment, like overturning US v Wong Kim Ark.

 

I asked AI, because I'm over my head here.

**Plessy and Dred Scott actually illustrate the opposite of what you’re fearing. Those cases were overturned by the 14th Amendment — not because the Supreme Court carved out part of it. The whole point of Section 1 was to create an explicit constitutional guarantee that the Court cannot simply erase or narrow through judicial preference.

Wong Kim Ark is different from Roe because it isn’t based on implied rights or penumbras; it’s a direct interpretation of the text of the 14th Amendment and the common-law meaning of jus soli. Even if the Court revisits how “subject to the jurisdiction” applies to future births, they cannot carve out exceptions to the amendment itself or revoke citizenship already vested — Afroyim v. Rusk makes that absolutely clear.

So while the Court may refine the doctrine, there’s no historical precedent for the Court deleting part of a constitutional amendment or stripping existing citizens of their status. Dred Scott and Plessy were overturned because the 14th Amendment strengthened citizenship protections — not because it weakened them.**

 

Unlikely since no one yet is asking them to do such a thing. There are some MAGA politicians who would like to see it but Wong really is "settled law" and not controversial.

Among the huge number of Americans that would be affected is Ted Cruz!

 

I don't think so. Even if the Supreme Court rules in favor of the Trump administration, I don't think that would cause their citizenships to be revoked.

 

There is one reason the Supreme Court might agree to hear a case even when all the Circuits agree and a majority of Justices agree with those Courts and that's what to establish "once and for all" what the constitution means.

Cases with broad effects on a large number of people in many States are of this sort. Trump's Executive Order presents such an issue. I have to say, though, that this is a rare thing.

 

I do think we may see the Supreme Court adopt the "unitary executive" theory of the presidency. Whether I like it or not, the constitution really doesn't support the idea of "independent agencies".

 

Hunh. Gemini's interpretation of the majority opinion in Dobbs almost comically misses the point. Read the actual opinion, if you haven't already done so, and you'll see.

 

Gemini rushes to defend its honor:
"
**I’ve read the Dobbs majority, and that’s actually the point — the entire reasoning in Dobbs hinges on the fact that Roe was based on an unenumerated, implied right. The Court argued that because the Constitution doesn’t explicitly mention abortion, the judiciary had no authority to create a nationwide rule.

That logic does not transfer to the citizenship clause, which is explicitly written into the 14th Amendment. Dobbs overturned a judicial doctrine; Wong Kim Ark interprets a constitutional command. Those aren’t the same category of precedent, and they don’t fall for the same reasons.

Even critics of the current Court acknowledge that you can’t “overturn” plain constitutional text. At most, the Court might revisit how ‘subject to the jurisdiction’ applies to future births — but nothing in Dobbs provides a pathway for eliminating or carving out an explicit constitutional guarantee like birthright citizenship.**

Sir Goog, Genisis